That's a testament to the lack of quality 2s that have come into the league over the last few years, nothing more.

If you look at actual production, DeRozan was 37th among 2s last year in win shares and 45th in PER. Now those are admittedly not anywhere close to perfect measures and those lists invariably include some combo guards, but can you even make the argument that right now DeRozan is a top-20 shooting guard in the league? I don't think you can.

A mix of both talent and convenience. I don't really care how he earned his spot on the team but more on what he takes back from it. If he comes back from the camp feeling hopeless after being dunked over by Kobe and Wade during practice, then I'd rather see him play in the Drew League for the whole summer. But if he can step up his game, then great!

Homer is as homer does

Yes, of course, there is not doubt, it's obvious, why are we even debating, there is no other chance, I am positive that DeRo got the USA invite due solely to the Colangelo connection.

Anytime I need a good chuckle, I just come to Raps Repub and read all the homer-tastic stuff guys write about Demar. He's never going to be on team USA, he's never going to be an all star, and he would not start on a playoff team. He's not a foundation piece or a building block.

His PER last season was 12.87. That was good for 220th place in the leage. He's sandwiched between Tayshaun Prince and Lavoy Allen.

A couple things to put aht 12.87 in context:

--> The main knock on PER is that it far too heavily weighs offensive performance. Demar's known as a better offensive player than defensive, so his 220th placing might actually over-value his contributions.

--> Demar's stats came on a bad team where he was given every chance to chip in or even lead the offensive attack. That 220th ranking could be inflated because for the "good stats/bad team" corollrary.

The guy is supposed to be best as a scorer and he put up 42 FG% and 21 3P%. He's allegedly a hard worker, but has not developed an outside shot on 3 NBA seasons.

Looking at basketball-reference, here are the players that display under his similarity scores section:

It seems like nearly all of DeRo's upside is extrapolated from his athletisim and youth, not from any real production or on-court improvements. After 3 years watching the guy, our management brought in 2 other guys that play his spot this offseason (reaching in the draft for one and badly overpaying for another).

The fact that he's getting good exposure to great players thanks to BC's daddy is the only thing to actually get excited about when it comes to Demar.

Now please, somebody tell me that I need to get my facts straight and that Demar is headed to Springfield.

When you see derozan at the slam dunk competition its hard to deny that he has athleticism. But, when you see him defend, he appears unathletic. I think it is lack of effort on the defensive end.

I am going to go out on a limb and say that if bargnani stays healthy this will be a breakout season for demar, on both sides of the ball.

Asking him to be a number one option is too much at this stage in his career. But as a secondary option with bargnani spacing the floor and lowry penetrating i can see him get 18 to 20 pts a night. I just wish he could grab 3-4 boards a night too.

I can think of a couple of advantages that Derozan has. Demar, at his best, is good at driving to the basket and getting to the free throw line. The other advantage is that in three seasons he has proved to be very durable with few injuries that took him out of action. Can't say that for many other Raptors.